Seventeen Things You Can Do to Protect Yourself from Food Poisoning

Each year over seventy-five million people get sick from the food they eat. Five thousand of those end up dieing from their illness. The Center for Disease Control ( CDC ) estimates that over eighty percent of all food-borne illnesses are caused by unknown or undiscovered agents.(1) The time from exposure to illness varies greatly with food-borne infection. Onset can occur as soon as twenty minutes or stretch out as far as six weeks from the exposure window. Women who are pregnant as well as young children, the elderly, and those with a compromised immune system should take extra precautions to avoid food poisoning as they are in high risk categories for severe reaction to exposure. Protecting yourself from food poisoning is becoming more and more important as public health data findings show an five times increase in the amount of harmful bacteria in our food supply in the year 2000 when compared to data from the early 1940's.(2). If you are curious as to what you should do if you have food poisoning check out my article on that at:

www.associatedcontent.com/article/811521/what_should_you_do_if_you_develop_food.html

A proactive approach is the best way to protect yourself from food-borne illness. Here are seventeen things you can do to protect yourself from food poisoning

The best way you can protect yourself from food poisoning is to wash your hands frequently when cooking and/or handling food. Wash with soap and hot water before and after handling uncooked food.

Always keep your refrigerator and freezer cold. Common bacteria grow rapidly if the temperature of their medium is over forty degrees Fahrenheit. Your freezer should be set a zero degrees Fahrenheit.

Wash your cooking utensils thoroughly and keep them in a clean dry place.

Cook all of your meats and eggs thoroughly before eating them. Internal temperature should be at least 160 degrees Fahrenheit to protect yourself from food poisoning.

Refrigerate your leftovers quickly after meals. As soon as your foods have begun to cool it is time to refrigerate them. This is especially important with seafoods and other meats.